Aside from winning the lottery and maybe the birth of a child, the next most special day is driving home in a brand new car. It’s definitely a defining moment to show off new wheels and a flawless whip, but with it is also a hefty price tag. Your new investment deserves attention and proper care to ensure its longevity for years to come. After all, there’s no greater feeling than keeping your new car in pristine condition. Learning how to prevent paint chips on a car is a factor every car owner should familiarize themselves with.
Denver Auto Shield is a leading provider of car ceramic coatings and paint protection film (PPF) that helps protect your vehicle. For more information on our professional services contact us directly at (720) 662-8250.
Causes Of Paint Chip On A Car
It’s common for vehicles to get paint chips. Flaky paint can damage the luster and appearance of a new or older vehicle. There are a number of common factors that may cause paint chips. In almost all cases, weather plays some role in the lifespan of your vehicle’s paint. Additionally, factors such as:
- Chemical cleaners
- Accidental scratches
- Natural causes
can also cause damage to your car’s exterior paint. Unfortunately, it’s difficult and, arguably, next to impossible to know how to prevent paint chips on a car. We live in a busy world with heavy traffic on highways, unkempt parking lots, and roads. This is especially true in the Denver area where harsh weather conditions can eat a car’s exterior causing wear and tear in more pronounced degrees.
Chemical Cleaners
In order to learn how to prevent paint chips on cars, it’s critical to pay attention to the types of products used when cleaning a car’s exterior. Consulting with an experienced vehicle detail professional can make a world of difference when it comes to caring for your car’s upkeep. Harsh chemicals to avoid include:
- Abrasive materials
- Brake fluid
- Gasoline
- Shaving cream
- Shoe polish
The types of products used on a vehicle’s paint matter. Gyeon Quartz, for example, offers some of the best products in the industry that are non-abrasive and provides extra layers of protection for your vehicle’s overall health. It’s also important to avoid dirty or used products like rags, sponges, and towels that may have collected dirt and tiny particles that can ultimately scratch the surface of your car.
Accidental Scratches
Similar to harsh products, accidental scratches may occur and should be avoided as much as possible. It’s important to work on keeping products, merchandise, and other heavy items from resting on top or against your vehicle. Depending on the quality of your paint job, some paint is not as durable as others. Consider the following tips from Fix Auto USA:
1. Driving and Parking a Car
Driving cautiously and being hyper-alert in busy and congested areas can help prevent paint chips on a car. Avoid tight sections where an object can possibly cause unforeseen damage. Parking farther away from a building may cause added steps, but the exercise might be worth the costly damage that happens in busy parking lots. Reducing the probability of visible scratches and dings to your car begins with preventative measures.
2. Car Treatment
While cars are not living and breathing people, they can be considered extensions of our personalities and interests. If you’re working to protect your vehicle’s lifespan, understand that the proper steps should be taken to treat your car well. This may mean not allowing family and friends to sit against your car or place items on top of it.
3. Washing Your Car
Generally speaking, washing by hand is less risky than using an automatic car wash, which is more likely to scratch your car. On the other hand, if you don’t know what you’re doing, washing your car is one of the easiest ways to accidentally scratch the paint. This can happen when you use a sponge to scrub, for example. The best method of cleaning a vehicle is to use a professional auto detailing service, or invest in products that are designed to help you care for your vehicle properly.
Another cause of chips and scratches is contaminating a bucket of soap with grime. If you just use one bucket, make sure to rinse off your towel each time. Otherwise, you are essentially rubbing dirt back into your car’s paint.
Don’t use a paper towel or dry cloth to get rid of grime, which could create friction and cause a scratch. Also, if you clean from the bottom up, you risk transporting the grime on the bottom of the car to the top. Always wash from top to bottom.
Maybe one day there will be scratch-free car paint and a scratch-free car. But for now, don’t take scratches lightly. If left untreated, they could become a catalyst for corrosion. Learning how to prevent paint chips on cars begins with proper routine maintenance.
Natural Causes
As much as we try to avoid outside factors from impacting our vehicle’s health, it’s unavoidable. Direct sunlight, for instance, causes your car’s paint job to fade prematurely. The sun essentially makes your paint oxidize, causing the pain to peel away from its protective layers. Additionally, in Denver’s harsh winters, salty solutions from roadways can get swept up in your car’s undercarriage and on the exterior paint, causing erosion.
You may also contend with wind damage, bug splats, tree spa, wind debris, and more. Finding methods in how to prevent paint chips on a car usually means taking precautions when it comes to the outside environment. Keeping your vehicle under an overhead cover or inside a garage can help ensure your paint stays pristine. Similarly, you can use waxing products and other detailing items that help to extend your vehicle’s longevity.
Protecting Vehicle Paint: Clear Bra & Ceramic Coating
With modern technology comes simplified solutions. When it comes to answering the best methods of preventing paint chips in a vehicle, look no further than clear bra installation and ceramic coatings, or paint protection film (PPF). When your vehicle is constantly exposed to temperature fluctuations, environmental concerns, accidental damage and more, it’s important to take strides in finding additional solutions that can help extend the life of your car’s paint.
Two options offer a new type of technology designed for the benefits of extreme protection against exterior wear and tear. Those two options include:
Clear Bra
Clear Bra is made from a transparent urethane material. It is known for several different features including being:
- Cost-effective
- Durable
- Lightweight
It helps keep different types of vehicles looking better for longer. Clear bras are not brittle or susceptible to external damage. In fact, it’s known for being highly resistant to abrasion, corrosion, and impact, in addition to being flexible and resilient.
Denver Auto Shield offers professional clear bra installation. In our shop, the primary function of a clear bra is to protect the underlying paint from accumulating rock chips. It does this by absorbing the impact of road debris, dispersing that impact within the soft layers of urethane, and preventing the force of the impact from chipping and permanently damaging the paint.
Learn more about how a clear bra can protect your vehicle from damage and paint chips.
Ceramic Coating
Ceramic coating protects a car’s paint from blemishes and damage while keeping it cleaner for longer. After application, it also makes follow-up car washes easier and shields the car from harmful UV rays. Ceramic coating creates intense water beading and dirt run-off and gives a car an extremely glossy shine.
Ceramic coating should be applied once your car is in tip-top shape after a wash. Be sure not to leave any contaminants, dirt, or oily films on the car, as the ceramic coating will not be able to properly seal.
Ceramic coating is a liquid polymer that is applied by hand to the exterior of a vehicle. The coating chemically bonds with the vehicle’s factory paint, providing a sufficient layer of protection. While ceramic coating is not a substitute for Paint Protection Film, which is a more comprehensive defensive product. Ceramic coatings, instead, create a permanent or semi-permanent bond with a vehicle’s paint and do not require repeated application every few months. Ceramic coatings provide the following benefits:
- UV Damage / Oxidation Protection
- Chemical Stains and Etching Protection
- Easier cleaning
- Enhanced Gloss
Primarily it also eliminates the danger of scratches, swirl marks, and rock chips. Ceramic coating is scratch-resistant, but proper precautions in parking lots and in extreme weather should still be considered.
Denver Auto Shield
Clear bra is the only way to protect your car’s paint from Road Debris Impact (aka Rock Chips) which looks terrible and lowers the value of the vehicle. We proudly provide automotive clear bra installation and ceramic coating for the best car paint protection in the Denver area. Contact us directly for full service and additional information at (720) 662-8520.
